


Light Outlives the Star

by sanidine



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Battle of Starkiller Base, Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Conspiracy, Cross-Generational Friendship, Family, Female Friendship, First Love, Flashbacks, Gen, Grandparents & Grandchildren, Inspired By Tumblr, Murder, Original Character Death(s), Original Character-centric, POV Original Character, POV Second Person, Rebel Alliance, Revenge, Space Flight, Space Grandma Kicks Ass
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-05
Updated: 2016-02-05
Packaged: 2018-05-18 09:04:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,018
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5919568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sanidine/pseuds/sanidine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You are seventy-two years old when you join the Rebel Alliance. </p><p>((Inspired by that tumblr post and commentary about lady A-Wing pilots that got cut from the original movies.))</p>
            </blockquote>





	Light Outlives the Star

You had been seven years old the first time you shot the blaster rifle. The rifle was almost bigger than you were, back then, and you were pretty sure that if anything in the universe had magical powers it was your Grandad’s rifle. Grandad Lusk had picked up the C-211 Assault Saboteur back in the days before he was a farmer, and he had let you carry it out back behind the hangar-barn while he had gone ahead to set up the target drone. Even now you remember how proud you had been, how careful to make sure you carried it right. 

“Alright, Wyla. Like we practised.” Grandad Lusk had been teaching you the basics of the rifle for the past three days, so you knew what to do. 

You laid out prone, made sure the stock wasn’t pressing on your collarbone, took your time lining up the shot. The sun and the planet had been setting behind you, and they threw long shadows across the fields, cast everything in a hazy orange glow as you peered down the scope and squeezed the trigger. The kickback had startled you, made you yelp. Grandad had warned you about it, but you had also seen him shoot plenty of times and he had never seemed troubled by it (you had always seemed to forget that you were smaller than almost everything else). You hadn’t seen if the shot hit anything, you just heard your Grandad laughing so hard that he had to double over, hold himself up against his knees.

You had been so embarrassed that you had wanted to die, so sure that you had missed the shot entirely. But once Grandad had stopped laughing long enough to go get the target and bring it back over you got the joke. The target drone had been programmed to hover in place about fifteen feet off the ground, and there were little clamps on the bottom of it that attached to the dangling bullseye plate. The bullseye was unmarked, not a scratch on it, but you had managed to shoot the drone pretty much dead center.

“Knocked ‘er right outta the sky.” Grandad Lusk had said, beaming down at you. “Gonna get yer sharpshooter marks just like your old Grandad, huh?”

“Yep.” Where you had been embarrassed only moments ago, you felt so happy and proud that you were all but vibrating with it. You stared up at the black and gold chevrons tattooed behind his ears. 

“Alright, then.” Grandad had reached down and ruffled your hair, then slung the target drone over his shoulder. “C’mon. Now you're gonna learn how to help me fix this thing. Not tired are you Wyla? Need me to carry the rifle back?” 

“Nope.”

“That’s my girl.”

Ten years later you would meet Orrin, trying to teach him how to shoot. Orrin Evoros was the grandson of Obath Evoros, who had been Grandpa Lusk’s first mate and gunner before they got out of the smuggler business and settled down. Orrin Evoros was also the worst shot on the entire moon of Zovis. Completely hopeless. The two of you were basically the same age, but while you had already had your sharpshooter marks tattooed on for two years, Orrin had yet to even make a successful hunt. Things didn't exactly get off to an auspicious start when he broke his own nose during the first shooting lesson.

It was hardly your fault. Did you really need to tell the boy not to hold the damn rifle stock up directly in front of his face? Better bet he would never do it again though. Just like touching a hot stove, or playing too close to the exhaust vents of a ship that had just landed. 

At the time, you had cursed at Orrin while you shoved a rag on his face and swore that the only reason you didn't call the lessons off then and there was because his inability to learn basic marksmanship was making you look bad in front of Grandad. Orrin never got any better at shooting, but that was just because he was too busy looking at you to pay attention to what you were trying to teach him.

Eventually, Grandad Lusk’s rifle had become your rifle. A wedding gift. You would go on to teach each of your kids how to shoot in the same way - the six that were yours by blood and then the two that you and Orrin had raised as your own after their parents and third triplet died in a fire. Then you had taught all of their kids with the same rifle. Even though your kin had all earned their own marks, and the big old C-211 was far from the best blaster for teaching kids. It was just the family tradition. 

Then one day you realized that Grandad Lusk’s rifle had somehow become Grandma Wyla’s rifle to everyone but you. Great-grandma Wyla’s rifle.

\---

You woke up early, before the sun, yawning as you pulled on your overalls and dug the death sticks out of the bib pocket. They were a little bit crumpled but nothing you couldn't  straighten out and light up anyway. Blowing smoke through your teeth, you drifted up from the berth to the cockpit of the  _ Annie’s Legs _ to review the exterior camera footage from the night before. Slow-forwarding through hours of nothing but waving grasses, you kkept one eye on the screens as you smoked your cig and drank your coffee and worked your long white hair into a loose braid. 

Something flickered and your hand shot out like a flash to pause the feeds, then you scrolled your hand across the dash controls to rewind. There they were. About two hours ago a herd of six-legged antelope had grazed across the field of the ship’s dashcam, moved north and out of view. Stubbing out the butt of your cig, you reached over to call up a topo map, already planning. If nothing had chased them off course, the antelope would probably have moved north and dropped down to shelter the valley. You would have to take the speeder out a good part of the distance (your days of shrugging carcasses up on your shoulders and hauling them kilometers overland were long past) but if you left it at the crest of the ridge and dropped down into the valley on foot you bet you could have one of the antelope bagged before the sun made it over the horizon. 

Had to get a move on, though.  You grabbed a couple of protein bars, slung the rifle strap over your shoulder, and you were tapping your toes waiting for the  _ Legs’ _ ramp to lower when you heard the grating chime of an incoming message on the ship’s communication system. 

Damn it.

The  _ Annie’s Legs _ \- an old school 4C3 transport that was even older than your Grandad’s rifle - had originally been designed for a crew of five, but you had taken it out by yourself up to the tallgrass prairie on the northern edge of the continent. You had done this much to the worry of your children and grandchildren, who seemed to have forgotten that you had lived on this moon for seventy-two years and flown the ship solo for more than half of that. Seventy-two wasn't as old as it used to be, anyways, and so what if you wanted to go hunting for a couple days and smoke some death sticks in peace? You would have to show up at East Eudora in three days to pick up a shipment of phosphate, but until then your time was your own, dammit.

So, you almost ignored the message chime Convinced that it was just one of the kids comming to check that you hadn’t broken a hip or accidentally greased yourself in the mere eighteen hours since you’d left the farmstead. You almost just took off on the speeder, but then you figured that it was worth five minutes to reassure the family and make sure they didn’t call out a rescue squad. 

Sighing, you trudged back up into the cockpit, already scowling as you palmed the button to accept the call. But you came up short when Coranni’s face fuzzed into view, black and white.

“Coranni? I thought you were planetside for another two weeks.”

“I am, Grandma. Or … … … supposed to be. I’m bouncing the signal … … … need you to -” the screen fuzzed out in static and you glanced up over it, out the front viewport of the ship. 

As always, Halopherian III took up a good portion skyline. The planet didn;t  have any oceans, and the yellow and orange topography of the continents always seemed to make the sky of Zovis seem even bluer, brighter. Halopherian III was the biggest planet in your system, great for mining rare minerals, not so great for living on. Zovis was it's single, small, primarily agricultural moon. Coranni worked on the planet for rotations of three weeks running geological surveys and planning future excavations. 

The snow in the screen finally resolved back into an image, and you looked back at Coranni’s worried face “Grandma? Can you hear me? The jumpship I’m hopping … … … in East E in around four hours. Can you come pick me up?”

“Of course I'll be there sweet thing. But Coranni, what happened?” Your granddaughter and her wife lived in East Eudora when Coranni wasn’t planetside. They had been trying for a baby for a while, you knew. “Is everything alright with Xano?”

“Oh shit!” You can’t tell for sure through the fuzzy black and grey video, but Coranni suddenly look pale. “Xano. You have to … … … to her first, okay? … … ... come after her when they can’t find me.”

“Coranni. Stop.” Your granddaughter is starting to panic, you can tell.  “What happened?”

“I got a message that … … … not meant for me, I think. Something about a First Order and mineral shipments? I’ll … … … more when I get there. I've got to go bef- … … ...” 

The last sentence comes through perfectly clear “Love you, Grandma. See you soon.” before the screen goes black.

On paper, the _ Legs _ belonged to your eldest son Von. He was the current holder of the family ag corporation and it made sense for tax reasons. In reality, though, she was your ship through and through and everyone knew it. You were one of the last living souls that had ever met Grandma Annie, whose younger self was still immortalized as the pin up on the ship’s starboard flank. These days you mostly used the  _ Legs _ to deliver shipments of chemicals and large farm equipment between the farflung landholdings of Zovis. Ever since you had handed over your involvement in the day to day operations of the farm you tended to take your time, tooling around and stopping to visit old friends in between deliveries. 

But god damn do you ever blow the dust off the thrusters that day. You cut across the sky like a bolt of lightning, like the wrath of the Void, calling out the infochants to broadcast a warning to any other ships in the vicinity that you weren't slowing down for anything. You make the trip to East Eudora in record time, but in the end it doesn't matter.

Your granddaughter is already dead by the time you bring the  _ Legs _ screaming into the dock. 

There was some kind of accident, is what they tell you when you storm into the offices of the mining cooperative. Your fourth eldest grandchild and an important shipment of neodymium are now nothing more than charred atoms in floating space. Coranni’s life was ended due to some faulty wiring, never mind that the jumpship she had snuck on had made the trip countless times before with no problems. She wasn't even supposed to be on that jumpship, they tell you, it was just an automated materials transport, not a personnel carrier, so the mining cooperative is absolved of any responsibility for her death.

By the way, do you have any idea why she was on that ship?

**Author's Note:**

> I write and edit everything on my phone, so if there are any particularly heinous errors please point them out to me :) I am always a slut for Doritos/comments/kudos!


End file.
